Motorola
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| Motorola Inc. | |
|---|---|
| Image:Motorola Logo.svg | |
| Type | Public (NYSE: MOT) |
| Founded | 1928 |
| Headquarters | Schaumburg, Illinois, USA |
| Key people | Edward Zander, CEO & Chairman Gregory Q. Brown (CEO as of 2008) |
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Products | Embedded systems Microprocessors Mobile phones Two-Way radios Networking Systems |
| Revenue | Image:Green Arrow Up Darker.svg$41.2 billion USD (2006) |
| Net income | Image:Green Arrow Up Darker.svg $4.578 billion USD (2005) |
| Employees | 66,000 (12/2006) |
| Slogan | Hello Moto and also "Intelligence Everywhere" |
| Website | www.motorola.com |
Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) is an American multinational communications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, a Chicago suburb.
Contents |
[edit] History
Motorola started as Galvin Manufacturing Corporation in 1928. The name Motorola was adopted in 1947, but the word had been used as a trademark since the 1930s. Founder Paul Galvin came up with the name Motorola when the company started manufacturing car radios. He created the name “Motorola” to suggest sound in motion (from “motor” and the then-popular suffix “ola”). The Motorola brand name became so well-known that Galvin Manufacturing Corporation later changed its name to Motorola, Inc.[1] Many of Motorola's products have been radio-related, starting with a battery eliminator for radios, through the first walkie-talkie in the world, defense electronics, cellular infrastructure equipment, and mobile phone manufacturing. The company was also strong in semiconductor technology, including integrated circuits used in computers. Motorola has been the main supplier for the microprocessors used in Commodore Amiga, Apple Macintosh and Power Macintosh personal computers. The chip used in the latter computers, the PowerPC family, was developed with IBM and in a partnership with Apple (known as the AIM alliance). Motorola also has a diverse line of communication products, including satellite systems, digital cable boxes and modems.
[edit] Products
Motorola creates several different products for use of the government, public safety officials, business installments, and the general public. These products include cell phones, laptops, computer processors, and radio communication devices. The Motorola RAZR line has sold over a 110 million units bringing the company to the number two mobile phone slot in 2005 (Nr 1 Nokia). The RAZR became a cult phone and many variations were produced.
[edit] Spinoffs
Motorola developed the first truly global communication network using a set of 66 satellites. The business ambitions behind this project and the need for raising venture capital to fund the project led to the creation of the Iridium company in the late 1990s. While the technology was proven to work, Iridium failed to attract sufficient customers and they filed for bankruptcy in 1999. Obligations to Motorola and loss of expected revenue caused Motorola to spin off the ON Semiconductor (ONNN) business August 4, 1999, raising for Motorola of about $1.1 Billion.
Further declines in business during 2000 and 2001, caused Motorola to spin off its government and defense business to General Dynamics. The business deal closed September 2001. Thus GD Decision Systems was formed (and later merged with General Dynamics C4 Systems) from Motorola's Integrated Information Systems Group.
On October 6, 2003, Motorola announced that it would spin off its semiconductor product sector into a separate company called Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.. The new company began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on July 16th of the following year.
See also: List of Motorola products (including Freescale's semiconductors)
[edit] Quality systems
The Six Sigma quality system was developed at Motorola even though it became best known through its use by General Electric. It was created by engineer Bill Smith, under the direction of Bob Galvin (son of founder Paul Galvin) when he was running the company. Motorola University is one of many places that provide Six Sigma training.
[edit] Ratings from interest groups
Motorola received a 100% rating on the Corporate Equality Index released by the Human Rights Campaign in 2004,[2] 2005,[3] and 2006,[4] starting in the third year of the report.
[edit] Trivia
| Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones. |
- Motorola was generally known as Ma Batwings to the radio industry, a not-necessarily-complimentary reference to the Ma Bell moniker of the Bell System. In each case, the nickname refers to the dominant position in their respective industries.[citation needed]
- Motorola pioneered the use of sub-audible tones (trademarked as Private Line by Motorola) to control radio equipment. The most common use of these tones is to open the squelch of radios when a certain tone is received, so that users don't have to listen to all of the traffic on their frequency, listening for their own callsign. The most popular use of "subaud" tones in ham radio is to close retransmission systems to any radio not sending the appropriate tone.[citation needed]
- Motorola commercial, military and public safety radio equipment uses microphones and speakers of impedance values different than the products of nearly all other manufacturers, as a means of discouraging third-party manufacturers of earplugs, remote microphones, etc.[citation needed]
- Many ham radio mountaintop repeater systems operate Motorola radios which have been in 24-hour-per-day service, 7 days per week, since the 1960s.[citation needed]
- In the 1970s, at the height of the Quadraphonic audio boom, Motorola manufactured chipsets and semiconductors for Demodulators and Decoders in home audio receivers, by a variety of different audio manufacturers.[citation needed]
[edit] References
- ^ Music in Motion: The First Motorola Brand Car Radio, Motorola Inc, <http://www.motorola.com/content.jsp?globalObjectId=8432-10811>. Retrieved on 2007-12-15 (see "Birth of the Motorola Brand")
- ^ Corporate Equality Index: 2004 Corporate Statements, hrc.org, 2004, <http://www.hrc.org/issues/workplace/4775.htm>. Retrieved on 2007-12-14
- ^ Corporate Equality Index: 2005 Corporate Statements, hrc.org, 2005, <http://www.hrc.org/issues/workplace/4776.htm>. Retrieved on 2007-12-14
- ^ Corporate Equality Index 2006, hrc.org, 2006, <http://www.hrc.org/documents/HRCCorporateEqualityIndex2006.pdf>. Retrieved on 2007-12-14
[edit] External links
Motorola phones | |
|---|---|
| A series | A760 · A780 · A830 · A835 · A845 · A925 · A1000 |
| C series | C115 · C139 |
| E series | E365 · E770 · E815 · E1000 |
| i series | i710 · i860 · i870 · i920/i930 · i880 · i455 |
| MPx series | MPx200 · MPx220 |
| T series | T720 |
| U series | U9 |
| V series | V60i · V180 · V188 · V190 · V220 · V265 · V276 · V325 · V360 · V400 · V525 · V550 · V551 · V557 · V600 · V620 · V635 · V710 · V980 |
| W series | W156/W160 · W175/W180 · W206/W213 · W220 · W370 · W377 · W385 |
| Z series | Z6tv |
| 4LTR series | FONE F3 · KRZR K1 · KRZR K1m · KRZR K3 · MING · PEBL · RAZR · RAZR maxx · RAZR 2 · RIZR Z3 · RIZR/ROKR Z6 · ROKR Z6m · RIZR Z8 · ROKR E1 · ROKR E2 · ROKR E6 · SLVR L2 · SLVR L6 · SLVR L7 · SLVR L9 · SCPL |
| Other | DynaTAC · MicroTAC · International 3200 · StarTac · Q · F3 · |
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Categories: Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange | Articles with trivia sections from October 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | Articles with unsourced statements since September 2007 | Companies established in 1928 | Mobile phone makers companies | Electronics companies of the United States | Companies based in Cook County, Illinois | Schaumburg, Illinois | Motorola
